Towards a Caribbean urban agenda (original) (raw)

Sarah Moorcroft holds a Bachelor of Commerce and is a Research Master student International Development Studies at the University of Amsterdam. 2 Referencing in this paper is limited in the text for readability but added to this paper is a detailed bibliography of (mostly) open access literature on urbanization, urban planning and individual critical urban issues. 3 UN-Habitat (2009). Planning Sustainable Cities. Global Report on Human Settlements 2009. the urban specificities of policy issues are often missing. Three arguments can be suggested to support a specific Caribbean Urban Agenda. First, research, policy making and program development must give attention to urban issues in the Caribbean. Addressing the urban context, whether in academic studies, policy making, or urban planning however, requires the combined effort of various academic disciplines or policy sectors. For example, problems of public safety require contributions from social, spatial and legal perspectives. Second, to address issues of flooding, the input of spatial planners, infrastructural engineers, social workers, and environmental specialists is required. Hence, to adequately address issues relevant to the urban sector or urban development, a holistic (or integrated) as opposed to sectoral approach is warranted. An urban agenda should be able to provide that. Finally, Caribbean cities share, amidst large differentiations, urban challenges and opportunities and can benefit from the exchange of knowledge and experiences regarding urban matters and solutions. Putting forward a Caribbean urban agenda fosters such exchange 4. 1.2. From a Global to a Regional and Local Perspective To date, the Caribbean Urban Agenda has been largely driven by a global perspective. As a first step, this paper examines and discusses how the global urban agenda has emerged from the documentation and literature of multilateral agencies (primarily UN Habitat), geographical groupings such as Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and the academic literature 5. Urbanisation and urban matters have re-emerged as an area of international academic and policy attention. Academics from a wide range of backgrounds, including Economics, Planning, Geography, Architecture & Urban Design, Environmental Sciences, Sociology and Anthropology address urban matters in scholarly articles. Multilateral agencies have put forward a wide range of programs to improve urban conditions in various critical domains of urban life such as housing, crime and violence, public safety, access to water and sanitation, local economic development, urban-rural linkages as well as in areas that relate to the managing or governing or cities such as participatory governance and decentralisation. Programs such as the Urban Management Program, Cities Alliances, the Safer City Program and the currently 4 The draft of this paper was presented during the meeting "Establishing a Policy and Research Agenda for the Urban Sector in the Caribbean"-Georgetown Guyana 6-9 of April 2011. 5 The SIDS have produced the Barbados Plan of Action (BPOA) in 1994 and the Mauritius Strategy for the Implementation of the BPOA (MSI) which was signed in 2005 and reviewed in 2010.